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I also pulled the trigger on s3d..

Michael, do you own Simplify 3D?

bubbasnow wrote:I also pulled the trigger on s3d..

Let us know how you feel about it after you have had a chance to put it through it's paces.

Eaglezsoar wrote:

bubbasnow wrote:I also pulled the trigger on s3d..

Let us know how you feel about it after you have had a chance to put it through it's paces.

single objects its working great, getting these multi-extruder prints to work is another story.

I purchased it after i waited 45 minutes for a multi-material stl in slic3r to export to gcode..Performance wise i sliced the same object in 30 seconds with this software.

*Sidenote*
I only use this for slicing, i haven't tried the host portion because i send it all to octopi

I use it primarily for slicing as well, although I do have it working great from simplify itself.

I just prefer all the control and such that repetier host offers for repetier firmware.

Got my smoothie board yesterday hurray!

It is excellent for adding infill at different heights or parts of the model. For example, I am printing a model now where the first 4 mm is at 25%infill, then 0% for 100mm, then 30% for the final 4 mm. I've been using it for 2 weeks now and it is working well.

alright looks like i got an OK setup for dual mat .stl

[img]https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-gDIq ... 185905.jpg[/img]

This is laughable... I registered on the S3D forum to ask some simple questions since the developer is cagey about his replies. Believe it or not, posts to the forum must be moderated. It has been well over a week since I asked a very simple question and my post has not seen the light of day.

mhackney wrote:This is laughable... I registered on the S3D forum to ask some simple questions since the developer is cagey about his replies. Believe it or not, posts to the forum must be moderated. It has been well over a week since I asked a very simple question and my post has not seen the light of day.

When I read things like this I become more wary of purchasing the product. No trials, a moderated forum with the type of experience you encountered, and cagey answers all add up to something that is not right.
Why a moderated forum where the moderator can pick and choose what gets posted? Not for me and I thank you for letting us know.

Eaglezsoar wrote:

mhackney wrote:This is laughable... I registered on the S3D forum to ask some simple questions since the developer is cagey about his replies. Believe it or not, posts to the forum must be moderated. It has been well over a week since I asked a very simple question and my post has not seen the light of day.

When I read things like this I become more wary of purchasing the product. No trials, a moderated forum with the type of experience you encountered, and cagey answers all add up to something that is not right.
Why a moderated forum where the moderator can pick and choose what gets posted? Not for me and I thank you for letting us know.

I'm not 100% sure why, but the S3D software is linked to your serial number (the .exe is linked). A better way of securing it would be implementing HWID and allowing people to enter their own serials. They could also do a timed-trial (ie: 30mins).

mhackney wrote:This is laughable... I registered on the S3D forum to ask some simple questions since the developer is cagey about his replies. Believe it or not, posts to the forum must be moderated. It has been well over a week since I asked a very simple question and my post has not seen the light of day.

yea i just posted something also and its not showing up.

And people actually buy software from a place that does these kinds of things? Not this people.

Eaglezsoar wrote:And people actually buy software from a place that does these kinds of things? Not this people.

it might be a method to avoid spam, or to ensure that initial complaints are seen by the appropriate eyes? we shall see i suppose

bubbasnow wrote:

Eaglezsoar wrote:And people actually buy software from a place that does these kinds of things? Not this people.

it might be a method to avoid spam, or to ensure that initial complaints are seen by the appropriate eyes? we shall see i suppose

Or just maybe it's to ensure that no negative remarks end up being posted.

My first post to that forum was moderated too before it showed up. I was quite irritated about that. I'm not saying I will never post there again but it will surely be awhile before I go back.

As for the software, it's pretty good. It's my favorite slicer but I have yet to dial things in on my Rostock. I bought it for the custom supports feature...and it's the fastest slicer I've used.

bubbasnow wrote:

Eaglezsoar wrote:And people actually buy software from a place that does these kinds of things? Not this people.

it might be a method to avoid spam, or to ensure that initial complaints are seen by the appropriate eyes? we shall see i suppose

Yea, a lot of the forums I frequent do that. Though the mods were pretty quick to allow the post. Might take longer for a post during a work day, because work and all, but usually the same day.

I run the Reelsmithing Forum and and in 5 years we have ZERO spam on that forum and nothing is moderated or censored. I have 100s of attempts by spammers every month to post all sorts of non-sense. Dealing with it effectively isn't rocket science and S3D is already doing what's needed by manually approving registrations. After that, no censoring is necessary. in the very rare event that a member gets approved and posts spam, that is easily dealt with but I ask one question on my registration form "Why are you interested in fly fishing?". It provides 100% accuracy for screening spammers.

Forums that screen posts and deny posting those they feel are contrary to their interests are censoring, not moderating. Moderating is a process to correct behavior, not prevent it. If S3D isn't happy with what people want to say on their forum they should either not have a forum, fix the problem, or here's a novel idea - actually participate in the forum and provide their side of the story. Communication is a powerful medium. Censoring is a powerful way to turn people away.

At this point, my 2 posts have still not been posted in over 9 days. I'm sorry but that's too long. And these posts were not inflammatory, rude or otherwise anything more or less what you would ready here.

If you want S3D for it's custom supports you should check out the interactive supports in Meshmixer, very slick and impressive! that is what I do when part needs support.
It is a extra step and MM orients the part wrong so you have to fiddle with rotation, but well worth it !!
MM makes these cool tree like structures with small tips that touch part... they easily beak off after print will barely a trace.
Meshmixer is FREE
http://www.meshmixer.com/

I did the Sea Serpent print with MM support.

This is basically the approach I take - I add the support structure in my source file and treat it like part of the actual design. MeshMixer gives you the edit ability in STLs, a nice feature.

cheers,
Michael

I am not familiar with MeshMixer and after looking at it briefly it looks as though it is also slicing software.
Could this take the place of Slic3r?

No, it doesn't generate gcode Eagle. It allows you to muck with the STL (mesh) file to do all sorts of cool things though.

bvandiepenbos wrote: I did the Sea Serpent print with MM support.

Nice, very nice !

I just went through all the tutorial videos, and I believe MM is worth learning, as it brings in a set of new tools. I am more of an engineer than of an artist, and as I see the videos, using MM is quite empirical. So I don't think I would use it a lot... but some times these tools can come in being handy.

Anyway, I was very interrested in what you said about supports, and was a bit disappointed when I did not see anything about that in the tutorials.
I will now try to install the software and search a bit more about these supports in MM, but if you could tell me more, that would be much appreciated !

In MeshMaker on the tools panel at the left: click Analysis->Overhangs you will see some support options there. The Advanced panel has more controls to tweak.

mhackney wrote:No, it doesn't generate gcode Eagle. It allows you to muck with the STL (mesh) file to do all sorts of cool things though.

DARN! I will definitely check it out though. I was hoping to get rid of Slic3r! Yeah, I know that there are other slicers out there but everyone has
it own limitations.

mhackney wrote:In MeshMaker on the tools panel at the left: click Analysis->Overhangs you will see some support options there. The Advanced panel has more controls to tweak.

So basically it is an STL editor. You can add support and make other changes then save it back to an STL and then slice it with one of the slicer programs. A round about way to do things
but at least you can choose where to add support, etc instead of relying on the slicer defaults. Just think how great such a program would be if it had the slicing built in.